


For More Than Just A Season

by Nununununu



Category: His Dark Materials (TV)
Genre: Cheering Someone Up After A Bad Day, Daemon Touching, Declarations Of Love, Don't copy to another site, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Feelings Realization, Fluff, Hugs, M/M, nose kisses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:47:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24307690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nununununu/pseuds/Nununununu
Summary: Iorek, Lee, Hester and the relative importance of things.
Relationships: Iorek Byrnison/Lee Scoresby
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27
Collections: Fluffy as a Cloud Flash Exchange





	For More Than Just A Season

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).



> For DoreyG, whose prompts were so excellent I couldn't choose <3
> 
> (Update 10.2020: one sentence slightly edited)

“Lee.”

Lee’s uncharacteristically quiet and contained, hunched over his portable stove to one side of the rudimentary camp they’ve made on a rocky outcrop barely big enough to contain themselves and the balloon, a small figure huddled within his many layers of clothes, made even smaller by the immensity of the steep mountains curved around and behind them, and the great chunks of sea ice ahead of them in the bay.

Hester’s hunkered down on his knees, both of his arms around her, only her little nose visible. It’s entirely unusual to see them like this – none of their usual banter, both of them motionless, not even the slightest trace of a smile on Lee’s face.

“Hm?” It takes a long moment for him to react to his name, glancing up from under the brim of his hat with eyes seeming somehow darker than usual, his mouth twisted at an unhappy angle before he catches himself.

Something aches within Iorek at the sight of his friend. The feeling doesn’t relent when Lee drags a determined breath in, straightening up on the upturned trunk he’s using for a seat, Hester poking her head out from under his chin in the attempt to liven herself up similarly.

Iorek inclines his head to her, “Hester.”

“Iorek, we’re –” There’s chagrin in her voice.

“Yeah, we’re –” Lee clears his throat.

“While what happened was unfortunate,” While he has no wish to interrupt, Iorek has no desire for either of them to apologise and certainly not to him, “Neither of you were in any way responsible.”

“But we were blown _miles_ away from where you spotted that sky-iron,” Lee’s grimacing even as he shoots a look back at the balloon and the regrettable state it is still in – and that’s after the work they all put into it after finally finding a stretch of land big enough to set down upon.

“If you hadn’t decided to show off,” Hester sniffs.

“If you hadn’t been so busy talking,” Lee returns.

“We will continue to rectify the damage on the morrow and will like as not be able to retrace our course if we so choose,” Iorek puts in before an argument can break out, “Given the height we were at before the windstorm, I cannot be definite it was sky-iron.”

“But you’re sure it was all the same,” Lee puts in and Iorek will not lie to him, to either of them – and his instincts have always proven true in the past.

“I am. But Lee, Hester,” He glances from man to hare, “We are all three unharmed. Is that not more important than anything else?”

“But –” Hester ducks her little head as Lee’s expression crumples.

“But if we _can’t_ find it again,” He sends a hand out in an uncharacteristically helpless gesture, “You’ve been searching for it for _so long_.”

“And I will continue to search,” Finally permitting himself to lean in as he’s been wanting to all this time, Iorek noses first at that hand, snuffling Lee’s palm, and then on up his arm until he reaches the side of the man’s jaw. Pausing there like that, _just_ off making contact, his muzzle very close to brushing the fine fur atop of Hester’s quivering ears. He lets his voice drop to a rumble, “If you believe me to consider sky-iron of more worth than yourselves, then I am at fault for having failed to express the extent of my regard.”

Nothing is more important to Iorek than his armour and the metal that will come to form it. Nothing except for this man and hare.

“ _I-Iorek_ ,” Both of Lee’s hands come up this time, not emptily but instead to wind fiercely around Iorek’s neck, the man tipping forwards off his seat as he strives to reach as far around the polar bear as he can manage. Aiding this endeavour by hooking his chin over his friend’s shoulder and lowering his own stance, Iorek adjusts his weight very carefully to allow yet more contact, an ear trained on Hester to ensure her safety when she wriggles off Lee’s lap, landing down in what little space there is between paws and feet.

“Hester?” Lee and Iorek both ask this at once, the pair of them drawing apart enough for Lee to reach down and scoop her back up with one hand, his other still slung around Iorek’s neck.

“Where do you think you’re going, huh?” He kisses her little nose.

“Nowhere,” She licks his chin in return, “It’s just – the two of you carrying on like this makes me want to –”

“Mm,” Biting his lip, Lee darts a swift glance between his daemon and Iorek, his cheeks colouring faintly as understanding and – something else – fills his expression, “ _Oh_.”

He looks – very much like he wants something. They both do.

“Yes?” Hester’s asking, and Lee nods.

“ _Yes_.”

“Hm?” Iorek only has time to blink before Hester’s stretching up on her hindlegs to nuzzle her little head in against his jaw. This is –

In between them, Lee goes stiff, making a sort of choking sound that might be a gasp.

_This is –_

In truth, Hester is so tiny Iorek has to concentrate to feel it at first. But feel it he does and the sensation rocks through him, making him sway on his haunches. Because the knowledge that this would be entirely taboo were he human – the knowledge that Hester is, as he understands it, in essence part of Lee’s very soul –

The thought of this display of trust –

“Hester,” Iorek’s nuzzling her back before he can stop himself, smoothing the fur between her ears, relishing the startled yet pleased noise she makes.

“Oh that’s –” Hester pushes into the touch.

“Lee,” Turning to the man once he’s groomed her to his satisfaction, Iorek allows himself to complete the action he very nearly did earlier, tucking his nose in against Lee’s jaw properly, muzzle very carefully grazing his throat. Waiting for Lee to object and pull back, delighted when he does neither, instead making a noise not unlike Hester’s and burying his gloved hands back in Iorek’s fur. “ _Lee_ –”

Iorek can’t seem to summon up any other words, in truth can hardly _think_ , drawing in the scent of his friends until he knows only Lee and Hester and nothing else, the little hare nudging gently in between them this time, butting her head up against Iorek’s jaw.

“Iorek, this is –” Iorek’s aware of supporting nearly all of Lee’s weight, slight as it is, the man leaning against him as if his own legs are no longer sufficient to hold him up.

“This is,” Iorek agrees, navigating the complication of Lee’s scarf to indulge in the greater scent he unearths on pressing his nose to the patch of skin revealed beneath it, very careful to ensure his teeth do no more than skim the base of Lee’s throat.

Lee shudders and exclaims as if Iorek had done far more than that and this –

If his friend were a fellow panserbjørne, a fellow polar bear –

Iorek cannot deny that this would be courting behaviour. The kind of gestures he would only ever think to indulge in with another bear during the season, one of the very few occasions in which he might come together with another of his own kind to offer such touch. The kind of gestures he would make with a mate, before the time came for them to part. But Lee –

Is human, and to think of him as anything else feels simply wrong, just as wrong as it would feel for Iorek to endeavour to imagine _himself_ human – the notion is absurd. Hester would not be present were Lee a polar bear, for a start, and the thought of leaving Lee after mating, after only a week or so –

No.

Now this – _this_ should also be unthinkable. The fact that Iorek has spent so much time with this human, with this daemon; the fact he wishes to continue doing so for as long as possible, for as long as the world around them and their lifespans allow –

“Lee, Hester,” The roughness of his own voice startles Iorek, the emotion barely contained within in it –

The thought of just how greatly he treasures them both. The thought of –

Panserbjørne do not think of things as lasting ‘forever’, for nothing does. Similarly they do not indulge in such human concepts as ‘love’.

And yet.

Withdrawing just far enough to focus on his friends’ dear faces once more, Iorek licks first Hester’s nose and then Lee’s, his own form of a kiss.

“ _Ah_ ,” The flush that blooms all over Lee’s face implies he’s well aware of this, Hester exclaiming softly likewise.

“As mentioned earlier, given my failure to previously inform you how much you both mean to me, I hope you will allow me to make the attempt now,” Iorek waits for both hare and man to agree, the latter biting his lower lip hard.

“I mean, uh. If you want to,” Lee gets out, “Sure.”

As attempts to appear casual go, this one blatantly fails given he’s nearly vibrating with eager anticipation and – and something else. Something Iorek is beginning to suspect is more complicated than simply _want_.

Something that quite possibly matches the emotions filling his own chest.

It is true he doesn’t have the words for it, not precisely, neither in his own language nor the human variants used here in the very north of the world. But –

But from what he understands of the concept of love?

It’s certainly a good start.


End file.
